Floyd Roland

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Power Corporation does have a claims policy in place that is available to every community as different things affect outages or problems. There have been many claims put in from different customers across the North. The reason that Inuvik is one that has been publicized is because it hit a large part of the community as a result of the outage and an overvoltage situation that fried many of the power bars and so on. In fact, when I was up in Inuvik it occurred and I happened to be in my office when my office one went out as well. Because it hit such a large part of...

That is a fair bit of detail that we’d go into, but the fact is we as a government have the work done to look at the delivery in today’s environment. Leading up to 2007, the government-of-the-day did that work. We also looked at that work and the consideration of what really needs to be done in the North was also put in place, a business case, and the negotiations around the AIP began in that manner. We have looked at those jobs. We have looked at what needs to be delivered and built the negotiation based on that. As I pointed out, the chief negotiators of both sides have signed a letter now...

Although it’s put out in the public, it’s interesting, I believe, as it first went out, CBC said it’s out there, but it’s still a confidential document. I don’t know how they could put that disclaimer in there. We have a process and we’re trying to honour that process. There are other partners involved in this and I want to respect them, being the aboriginal governments and the federal government. At some point we’ll have to make a decision on how we go forward. The typical process we’re involved in is laid out. It’s the normal practice. We’ll continue to use that.

I think the more important...

In my many years as a Member of the Legislative Assembly, I have heard about the fact that governments are not organizations, they are governments. Aboriginal governments are aboriginal governments. This government is treated and sat at a table in a scenario of government to government when it comes to aboriginal governments. We have helped fund those to be a part of our discussions as we go forward, helped influence what we should package together and how we go forward. Through this process and leading up to this, those that wanted to be at the table were at the table and influenced much of...

What the Member is requesting of me is one that the Executive Council will have to wrestle with as we hear the response back from the joint letter that went out to the negotiators as we hear back from Members of the Legislative Assembly on a decision forward. The fact that this agreement-in-principle highlights the working relationship government to government, After this, if a future government is to say yes, this agreement, the final agreement is done, we’re going to accept it, what we need to do is decide how we’re really going to negotiate. What we’ve talked about for almost three decades...

Mr. Speaker, the process leading up to this has been inclusive of all those who wanted to be at the table, who chose to be at the table and were funded to be at the table. They have been part of the working group at both technical sessions and negotiation sessions up to where we are today. They were informed of the process and the document in whole. We are now waiting to see their response to that document. Thank you.

In the life left in this 16th Assembly and the timelines we are faced with and what decisions can be put in place and acted on, our window is shortening every day. On top of that, the fact that we’re committed to working together with the aboriginal governments and the federal government on the process forward and that negotiation process would have to spell some of that out as to what we can start to look at and change and build into a work program that would go forward. It would be difficult to say that we could have it all done, wrapped up and ready to present.

What I could say is, depending...

Mr. Speaker, I’m understanding a little more on the question. The approach is coming up with a process of informing people and coming up with what people would like to see in a final agreement and, as we implement that agreement, what it should look like. I think we can have a discussion and I will commit to sit down with Members and with this Assembly and let’s talk about how we may be able to put that parallel to the work that we would take on. Thank you.

Some might say, in fact, that has been done in the past in the Northwest Territories when people say no, that’s not it, and walk away. We then talk about the revenues we left on the table, for example, as we have spoken with others in the past five years, we’ve left on the table $200 million of potential revenues that could have been a net benefit to northern governments.

As we were talking about earlier, in fact, a report that we just read earlier today highlights there’s going to be a need for more resources to implement any of those types of changes. In our environment today, we are unable...

Again, this AIP that’s before all the partners in the North as well as the federal government spells out an ongoing government-to-government relationship between aboriginal governments and the public government. This agreement-in-principle that’s before us as a government is one that recognizes the aboriginal rights. It does not take away from those. In fact, the language protects those rights in place of existing and future aboriginal governments.